IMPORTANT POINTS
LOA issued after 30th April would be beyond jurisdiction of AICTE.
When the Court left it open to AICTE to take a fresh decision in accordance with law uninfluenced by the earlier order of rejection, it cannot be construed as direction to AICTE to grant approval in breach of the statutory timelines specified in that behalf.

JUDGMENT

A.M. KHANWILKAR, J.

1. The petitioners have filed this writ petition under Article 32 of the Constitution of India for issuing a writ of mandamus or any other appropriate writ directing respondent No.1 to immediately issue a Letter of Approval permitting petitioner No.1-society to start its college, namely Anant Institute of Business Studies from the academic year 2017-2018. The petitioner No.1-society applied in February, 2017 to respondent No.1-All India Council for Technical Education (for short “AICTE”) for its approval to establish Anant Institute of Business Studies (for short “AIBS”). The Scrutiny Committee of AICTE (for short “SC”) tendered a report dated 01.03.2017. The petitioners assert that the report did not point out any deficiency and recommended grant of Letter of Approval to the petitioner No.1-society.

2. The said proposal was processed by different committees between March 2017 and April 2017, such as Expert Visit Committee (for short “EVC”) and the Standing Appellate Committee – Scrutiny Committee (for short “SAC -SC”). As the petitioners entertained some apprehension that there would be delay in processing the application, petitioner No.1-society rushed to the High Court of Madhya Pradesh Bench at Gwalior by way of Writ Petition No. 2793 of 2017. They prayed for a direction against the respondents to process the application as per the procedure given in Approval Process Handbook 2017-18 and consider the report of SC which has clearly mentioned that the two different institutes of the petitioners were on different patches of land and therefore to issue a Letter of Approval without any further delay and, in any case, to complete the process of approval before 30th April, 2017.

The respondent No.1-AICTE, however, issued a letter of rejection on 30th April, 2017. As a result, the writ petition filed by the petitioners before the High Court came to be dismissed on 16th May, 2017, as having become infructuous. The petitioners challenged the said decision before this Court by way of SLP (C) No.15799 of 2017 which was disposed of on 22nd June, 2017, in the following terms:

“ORDER

By two letters dated 30.04.2017, the first respondent rejected the applications submitted by the petitioners for setting up an Institute of Management and an Institute of Business Studies. The ground on which the rejection took place was primarily that when the EVC team proceeded to inspect the institutions, it was not allowed to do so.

When this petition came up before the court on 19.06.2017, a submission was made on behalf of the petitioners that having regard to the ground which weighed with the first respondent, the petitioners are ready and willing to submit themselves to a fresh inspection by an EVC team to be constituted by the first respondent. The hearing was adjourned to enable counsel for the first respondent to take instructions.

During the course of the hearing learned counsel appearing on behalf of the first respondent states, on instructions, that an EVC Team shall be constituted expeditiously and a fresh inspection shall be carried out within a period of two weeks from today. This, it has been submitted, is subject to two conditions; firstly, that the petitioners shall pay the usual charges and expenses for the inspection; and secondly, that one EVC team shall inspect both the Institutions. Both these conditions are acceptable to the petitioners.

We accordingly take on record the statement which has been made on behalf of the first respondent and direct that in consequence the earlier rejection of the proposal submitted by the petitioners shall not come in the way of the EVC team while carrying out a fresh inspection, as agreed. Thereupon, the first respondent 3 shall take a fresh decision in accordance with law expeditiously uninfluenced by the earlier order of rejection. If the petitioners are aggrieved by t